HONG KONG (AP) — Chinese university student Fleming Cheng found the political books he had only glimpsed online in a Hong Kong bookstore last year.
Before visiting Greenfield Book Store, Cheng had only managed to see the books' covers online after bypassing Beijing's internet censorship using a VPN. At the store, he picked up a title offering a critical account of China. He stood there devouring dozens of pages from another, about a pro-reform Chinese leader who fell from power for sympathizing with the protesters during the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy movement in 1989.
Cheng said he saw perspectives diverging from the mainland’s official narrative.
“A space of freedom,” he said.
